Push
by PhoenixRising360
Summary: Tony reflects on Gibbs' attitude toward him. Part 1/4 of the 'Moving Forward' Series.


The crushing weight bore down on his shoulders like a vise tightening in a death grip. Reality was caving in and no longer could he continue to look away from it, no matter how much he might want to.

Tony DiNozzo rolled his shoulders to disperse some of the tension. The bullpen was quiet. Gibbs and Bishop were picking up a suspect. McGee was down in the lab helping Abby decrypt a handful of laptops found at their lastest murder victim's apartment. That left Tony to do the boring tedious background, financial records and phone history research.

Of course, this was okay. He had done this first as a detective and then as an NCIS agent countless times. It was a normal part of the investigative process. It was tedious at times, boring at others, but once you put all the pieces together, the reward of catching the criminals made all the tedium worthwhile. Tony loved that. It made him feel useful, needed, and satisfied.

Well, it used to.

He sighed and glanced over at Gibbs' empty desk, noting the empty coffee cup sitting there. Sad, useless cup. No coffee to be found. No reason to still be sitting there. Alone. Pointless. When Gibbs came back, he would toss the cup in the trash and never give it another thought. Tony shivered. Right now, he could relate to that feeling.

Gibbs was pushing him out. Really pushing. For the first time ever, Gibbs was putting out the message that he didn't want Tony around anymore, that he wasn't needed and that Gibbs had eeked out all the usefulness Tony had to offer and now he had to move on. There were no more instances of Gibbs saying, 'good job, DiNozzo.' There were no satisfied smirks when Tony figured things out now. All the approval and praise Tony had ever wanted from the man he respected and used to admire most in the world was an empty well that had never been very deep to begin with.

It got Tony thinking. If he didn't stay on Gibbs' team, what would he do instead? He had already checked the job postings for NCIS and none of them appealed. There were always openings in the Family and Sexual Violence Unit but that was probably the last division Tony would ever want to work. There were terrorist task forces recruiting but Tony had more than enough terrorism after the fiasco with The Calling and there was no way he would want to do that.

He knew Fornell would offer him a job if he expressed interest but after having being investigated for murder by the Feebs so many times, there was no way he wanted to work for them. CIA was a no-go too. There were other alphabets that would probably try to court him as well but he wasn't so sure he wanted to do that either.

That left police departments. There were a lot of good ones, of course, in cities big enough to make him happy. They probably wouldn't have quite the prestige that came with living in Washington, DC but big cities were big cities and they would have their own versions of prestige, have the good things that he would like. He thought Metro might offer him a job if they had any openings, but he also had no real reason to stay here. Not anymore. Even Abby had been keeping her distance from him lately. Not in an overt, in your face way that was more her style, but it was subtle. It disturbed him more than if she had gotten in his face and said, "I don't like you." Whenever he went down to the lab to visit her just to say hi, she would be working on something, super-focused and shoo him away because she was busy. After the third time of this happening, he stopped visiting, expecting in a few days that Abby would march upstairs, punch him in the arm and demand to know why he hadn't visited her. When that didn't happen, he took the hint, and just stayed away. She sometimes came up to the bullpen for other reasons, and she was distantly friendly. Gone was his best friend of before. It hurt a lot, but he understood. Gibbs was pushing him out and Abby's loyalty was to Gibbs' first and everyone else last. Maybe he always should've known that Abby's approval of him would only go as deeply as Gibbs'. Now that Gibbs didn't want him…

What he lacked in friendship with Abby now seemed to have been filled by his friendship with Tim McGee. Tony smiled to himself. Lately, Tim had been more bold and outspoken in his attempts to get Tony to open up to him. Tony wondered about that. They didn't use to do buddy-buddy, tell me all your secrets but Tim had been pushing for it and at times it felt weird, and other times, it felt good. Tony liked being cared about. He liked that Tim pushed him to not hide behind his masks. The best part was that now Tony realized he didn't have to hide behind his masks for McGee. He didn't have to put on his game face and act like a fool. Tim knew better. It may have taken him a while but he figured it out. Though Tim had not yet said anything, Tony had noticed Tim furrowing his brow and giving Gibbs dark looks, like he couldn't figure out something. Tony realized that Tim maybe didn't like how Gibbs was treating him and didn't understand why. That made two of them. Though if Tony were really honest with himself, deep down he knew why Gibbs was treating him the way he was. He thought it was time for Tony to move on, wasn't sure why he didn't and felt he needed to be pushed. What Tony didn't understand was why Gibbs just didn't come right out and say that. It wasn't like the man was ever shy about telling him what was what before, even if he did it in as few words as possible.

Tony printed off the information he collected and pushed his thoughts aside as he went through the phone records looking for patterns to solve this case.

The day progressed and Tony worked by rote, feeling almost like he was in a vacuum, or tunnel. Words and people flowed around him like water, hearing their words but not absorbing them, relaying his findings on the case, also by rote, leaving out movie references and jokes since Gibbs didn't seem amused by them anymore. Not that he had ever expressed amusement to begin with, but sometimes Tony could tell by the little smirk that he was amused and that had been enough. Now, Gibbs just stared at him blankly as though to say, "Why are you wasting my time?"

Still, Tony acknowledged. His investigative mind didn't stop working just because Gibbs didn't want to hear the train of thought that got him from point A to B. Really, he just liked to lighten the mood, make the job easier and more fun since so much of it was dark and gruesome. At least Ellie seemed to appreciate it and Tim as well most of the time.

He needed to talk to someone about what was going through his mind. He knew he needed to leave NCIS. That much was clear. He just didn't think he could do it without talking to someone about it. In the past, he would've been happy to sit on a sawhorse in Gibbs' basement and run his thoughts by his boss and sometimes confidante, but those days were past. As Gibbs stepped back from that role, Tim had stepped in, filling that role in a way Tony had never expected. Tim seemed to really appreciate it and enjoy it when Tony shared, and Tim also usually had some pretty decent advice. Not that Tony had shared a lot with him; but what he had shared Tim had treated like a gift rather than a burden.

He made up his mind. He would talk to Tim and Abby. He would confront Abby and get to the bottom of her behavior, maybe even find out if Gibbs put her up to her treatment of him. This was not how you treat friends and as good a person as she usually was, she needed reminding that they were friends and he deserved to be treated better. It was true she'd just been really busy with work - the cases seemed to be plentiful of late - but other than her shooing him away, she didn't act any different around anyone else that he could see. So, he felt this was specifically about him. They'd been friends too many years for him to walk away without knowing why and where he stood with her.

He suspected he would need to talk to Gibbs too eventually but he also knew Gibbs wouldn't talk to him until Tony had at least one foot, if not both feet out the door. He didn't know how he knew that, but he did. He hated that it had come to this, and he was hurt and angry over it, but since when had Gibbs ever done anything but in his own stubborn, pig-headed way, even if it was wrong? Maybe he would confront that, too, even though it was probably an exercise in futility.

Tony ran his hands down his face. Talk to Tim first, he decided. Maybe he could even shed a little light on Abby's behavior so he wouldn't go into that conversation blind. One thing Tony had learned in 16 years is that you have to go into conversations with Abby with as much information as possible.

In his vacuum, he vaguely heard Gibbs tell them to go home, be back early toorrow and Tony immediately started shutting things down and putting things away. Usually, he would stay late and finish off paperwork or continue working the case but between Gibbs mostly ignoring him and his inability to hear out of the vacuum of his mind, he didn't see the point of trying. It wasn't like Gibbs would care either way at this point. He didn't even bother to say goodbye to his boss as he left with Bishop and McGee though he heard them do so.

In the parking garage, the trio went their separate ways. Tony had thought about asking Tim to come over for that talk but realized he wasn't quite ready for that conversation yet. Soon though. He just needed to break down another wall or two before he felt comfortable baring more of his soul to Tim. Not like he had much practice at it. He had spent too many years dazzling, deflecting and distracting from his soul to be comfortable revealing it. But maybe it was time. Maybe he was comfortable enough in his own skin now that he could. He had Tim McGee to thank for that. For once, he didn't owe something to Leroy Jethro Gibbs. Maybe…just maybe…it really was time to move on.


End file.
